Famous Sikhs:Gurbachan Singh Talib

Gurbachan Singh Talib was a scholar, author and teacher, famous for his
command of the English language. He was master equally of the written
as well as of the spoken word. He was born in a small town, Munak, in
the present Sangrur district, on 7 April 1911, tht son of Sardar Kartar
Singh and Mata Jai Kaur. His father was an employee of the princely state
of Sangrur. He passed his matriculation examination from the Raj High
School, Sangrur, in 1927, securing a merit scholarship, and went up to
the Khalsa College, Amritsar, where he received his Master's degree in
English literature in 1933, topping the Panjab University. Soon after
receiving his Master's degree he became a lecturer in his own college,
starting a very spectacular scholastic career. His first class first in
the M.A. examination was an unprecedented event in the annals of the University
for never before had the distinction been claimed by a mofussil college.
This halo won him the instant esteem of his colleagues and pupils. He
took to the academic groove like fish to water. Much mythology accrued
to his name. Soon he became a legendary figure in the college. Many stories
became current about his exceptional diligence, his spontaneity in the
English language and the diversity of his scholarship.

He left the Khalsa College in 1940 to join the newly started Sikh National
College at Lahore where he served in the Department of English as a lecturer
for several years. From 1949 to 1962 he worked as principal, successively,
at Lyallpur Khalsa College,Jalandhar, Sri Guru Tegh Bahadur Khalsa College,
Delhi, Khalsa College, Bombay, Guru Gobind Singh College Patna, and National
College, Sirsa. He was Reader in English at Kurukshetra University from
1962 to 1969, and Professor of Sikh Studies in the Guru Nanak Chair Panjab
University, Chandlgarh, from 1969 to 1973. In 1973, he translated himself
to the Punjabi University, Patiala, where he began the most productive
years of his career. He took over at Banaras Hindu University the Guru
Nanak Chair of Sikh Studies, but had to leave soon for reasons of health.
Back at Patiala, he was made a fellow of the Punjabi University in 1976
and he launched upon the stupendous project of rendering the entire Guru
Granth Sahib into English. In 1985, he received the Government of India
award Padma Bhushan. He resigned the Punjahi University fellowship in
1985 to take up the National fellowship offered hy the Indian Council
of Historical Research, New Delhi. He suffered a massive heart attack
in July 1976 which he survived; the second one on the morning of 9 April
1986 however proved fatal.

Professor Gurhachan Singh Talib was a prolific writer both in English
and Punjabi, though he knew Persian and Urdu very well, too. Among his
best-known books in Punjabi are: Anapachhate Rah (1952); Adhunik Punjabi
Sahit (Punjabi Kav) (1955); Pavittar Jivan Kathavan (1971); Baba Shaikh
Farid (1975), and in English "Muslim League Attack on the Sikhs and
Hindus in Punjab, 1947 (1950)"; The Impact of Guru Cobind Singh on
Indian Society (1966), Guru Nanak: His Personality and Vision (1969),
Bhai Vir Singh: Life, Times and Works (1973); Baba Sheikh Farid (1974);
Guru Tegh Bahadur: Background and Supreme Sacrifice (1976) Japuji: The
immortal Prayer-chant (1977); and his classical translation in English
of the Adi Guru Granth (Four Volumes). Besides these books, he kept an
unending flow of articles and papers contributed to different journals.

Article taken from these books.
Encyclopedia of Sikhism edited by Harbans Singh ji.

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